No, his point seems to be that bitcoin can be transferred without the approval or moral judgement imposed by a third party (e.g. bank).

Try sending $1B around the world to your Nigerian uncle and seeing what happens.

Various governments will be more than happy to apply their large resources to a $1B Bitcoin transaction if they can find a hint that it's in their jurisdiction.

They most certainly will... But at least the money was sent.

Nothing they can do to stop that.

>Try sending $1B around the world to your Nigerian uncle and seeing what happens.

I'm sad that I have to inform you that the emails you've been getting aren't actually real

Not scammed, but maybe a regulator will take an interest in $1B being moved around.

Is the average person in our society better off in a world where anyone can move $1B anonymously? Why do you think regulators might want to take an interest in such transfers?

No the average person is less well off in a world where $1 billion can be moved anonymously.

The need to move such funds anonymously is usually due to illegal activities, money laundering, or at least tax evasion (evasion, not avoidance).

This leaves every average person at the very least, on the hook to pay for those taxes evaded, or lacking the services they would have provided.

If the need is due to criminality beyond tax evasion, every average person suffers the corrosive effect of that criminal activity (e.g., while I'm for most drug legalization, I can't begin to argue that organized criminal drug distribution is anything but a massive destructive tax on society - & in fact, a main point of legalization is to eliminate that corrosive costs of gangs).

So, the average person is definitely worse off with the existence of an ability to move & billions anonymously.

(edit: avoided/evaded)

I'm sorry plenty of people would disagree with our taxing system, 99% of them not being drug Lords. I think most people would be better off with the ability to move billion of dollars anonymously, as it would also give them the ability to move hundreds or thousand of dollars anonymously as well.

I fall into that category.

Most people I know, and they aren't rich tax avoiders would also fall into that category.

Cryptocurrency liberates everyone in so many ways. And yes it liberates criminals as well. But hey are know how to dodge the system anyway.

Perhaps I'm missing something, but I'm seeing you specify the use-case other than 'less-rich people can also move money anonymously'.

Other than small-scale tax evasion or nefarious activities, what use cases are you advocating?

I also used to be pretty excited about the potential for crypto currencies, still think it may have some, but the security overhead, value volatility, & scalability issues have pretty much rendered it less useful than cash or (ugh) ACH-based services like Venmo, Google Pay, etc., ir just credit cards.

Also, you're not addressing losses of tax evasion - one tax evader failing to pay $1B in taxes means a million people need to pay an extra $1000 to make up for his crime. Not victimless.

Bitcoin transactions are already being de-anonymized at least in the U.S. - and if not today, the permanent ledger record means that the 'data exhaust' (hidden data surrounding a transaction) can back into it.

I don't know, is it that different from being able to send an encrypted message, or lock something securely in a safe?

Is there a difference between expressing moral support for a terrorist organization and sending them $1 million? I was never very compelled with the "money = speech" argument when taken particularly literally.

I didn't mean specifically that money = speech. I mean there are some things we agree should be private even if that means making them less accountable.

The point is the entire point of Bitcoin itself is to minimize or hopefully remove completely the requirement of trust.

You still have to trust the counterparty to deliver whatever the Bitcoin is being exchanged for.

not with a multi-signature address acting as escrow.

2013 called and wants its arguments back

In that case you still have to trust the escrow service.

Trust minimization instead of maximally trusting RBC with all of your money but also the counterparty to deliver.

yes. its an adaptation to that economy and allows for mitigating risks. not a panacea

the escrow service would be one party of the multisignature transaction. no party can move the funds on their own. you are moving an arbiter to the point of transaction, instead of after a transaction doesn't go as planned.